Killian Jornet: VK10K

Absolutely nuts, this man is an insane mountain athlete.

The dude covered a 10k distance in less than 30 minutes AFTER running up 3,200 feet in just 1.4 miles, which was done in less than 30 minutes.

What. The. F***.

Cue the haters and the not impressed people in 3...2....

Absolutely insane workout.

But the only people who are truly shocked by this workout are the "hur dur ultra runners suck and are slow."

Those that know what Kilian is capable of and follow the sport are more "yeah crazy workout, but thats kilian"

The 10k is about at/slightly faster than Kilian's half marathon pace.

Que not impressed people in 3...2....

Call me a hater but that GPS was off. Kilian is know for being a relatively slow road runner in the trail/ultra world, so a 29:30 road 10k on "mostly" flat roads after a hard trail effort sounds too good to be true. Just to compare: Walmsley's 10,000 PR is 29:09 on a track in spikes. Still a great workout and Kilian is the GOAT!

buzzcolorado wrote:

Que not impressed people in 3...2....

Call me a hater but that GPS was off. Kilian is know for being a relatively slow road runner in the trail/ultra world, so a 29:30 road 10k on "mostly" flat roads after a hard trail effort sounds too good to be true. Just to compare: Walmsley's 10,000 PR is 29:09 on a track in spikes. Still a great workout and Kilian is the GOAT!

That 10k was from years ago. Kilian destroys Jim:

Jim ran:

Half: 1:04- 4:53 pace

Fulll: 2:15:05- 5:09

This tempo was 29:55 is 4:49 pace.

So half marathon pace. For 6 miles. That isn't absurd at all for a runner of his caliber.

shootpost wrote:

That 10k was from years ago. Kilian destroys Jim:

On the road??? K's GPS showed 10,080 meters, so it was 4:46 pace which is a 62:30 half. I seriously doubt K has that speed. Can't wait to see him do a road race that he puts in 100% effort for, training, taper, etc...

Considering he ran 2:25 for the CR at Sierre-Zinal last year (taking down the legendary record by 13:27 5km/ sub 28:00 min 10km mountain runner champion and Olympian Jonathan Wyatt). I'd say he's done that already.

But then 2 weeks later he "only" ran 3:28 (kicked my butt by 10-min +) at Pikes Peak Marathon....not even close to Matt Carpenter's record.

The interesting thing about Matt's "impossible record" is that I think it's a total outlier in the sport of MUT Running though. Like Matt only got within 20-min of that record time (3:16) one other time in his whole career at Pikes and it was his second fastest time ever on the mountain (3:33). Also for reference Matt only ran 2:40 at Sierre-Zinal that year (1993) vs Killian's 2:25 last year. Kilian is well altitude trained and even though his best strength is "technical trails and steep mountain stuff" he has the wheels for a course like Sierre-Zinal and Pikes (mostly smooth and very runnable).

I've seen Kilian personally drop sub 5-min/mile pace during trail marathons (Mont Blanc etc) and he's pretty darn smooth! I'd imagine a guy like Kilian should have the record at Pikes Peak, but it was pretty hot last year and he had no one to really push him (he was up the Ascent in like 2:08-2:09 and i was up in a measly 2:14).

Kilian is the GOAT mountain-ultra-trail runner in the world. Hands down.

https://historical.pikespeakmarathon.org/find.asp?Last=Carpenter&Mi=%20&First=Matt

Not exactly sure what your point is. To my knowledge Jim has never beaten Kilian in a race. Seems like Jim's times are fairly irrelevant when it comes to what Kilian is capable of.

And for all you know his GPS is off in the opposite direction and he possibly ran more than 10k.

buzzcolorado wrote:. Kilian is know for being a relatively slow road runner in the trail/ultra world, so a 29:30 road 10k on "mostly" flat roads after a hard trail effort sounds too good to be true.

No he is not. He was known for not enjoying flat running and never training it. Last year was the first time he started doing some speed work to go with his GOAT trail abilities , and he immediately excelled. Hes been jogging 15 minute 5k intervals , and running back to back 30 minute 10ks at tempo pace . He'll easily go sub 29 for 10k when he tries, and he'll be at least sub 2:12 in the marathon. Greatest aerobic base of all time added to this new speed and great things will happen

If you made today's workout into a race, a vertical KM followed by an immediate turnaround and descent, and then immediately into a flat 10k road run, Kilian would smoke any man on this planet. Bekele and Kipchoge would be at least ten minutes behind

buzzcolorado wrote:

Que not impressed people in 3...2....

Call me a hater but that GPS was off. Kilian is know for being a relatively slow road runner in the trail/ultra world, so a 29:30 road 10k on "mostly" flat roads after a hard trail effort sounds too good to be true. Just to compare: Walmsley's 10,000 PR is 29:09 on a track in spikes. Still a great workout and Kilian is the GOAT!

Dude has 4:10-15ish mile speed too. I don't think 29:30 is really that crazy for him.

See here:

MeHereYouWhere?! wrote:

The dude covered a 10k distance in less than 30 minutes AFTER running up 3,200 feet in just 1.4 miles, which was done in less than 30 minutes.

What. The. F***.

Cue the haters and the not impressed people in 3...2....

3200 feet in 1.4 miles is crazy. That's like 40+ % grade if my math is right.

Yeah, VKs are no joke and that one is pretty steep because he's using poles.

I wish we'd spot talking about his performance at Pikes Peak, Sage. That is Matt Carpenter's mountain... he knew every rock and step on that mountain, plus the elevation affects everyone differently, even if you are Jornet. Matt literally lived on that mountain and his race performances at SZ and in Europe confirm what an anomaly PPM was to Carpetner as he could not hold his own over seas.

Harambe wrote:

Dude has 4:10-15ish mile speed too. I don't think 29:30 is really that crazy for him.

See here:

https://www.letsrun.com/forum/flat_read.php?thread=10024050

At this point it's all speculation based on garbage data. Notice how he removed the times from the IG post. I couldn't find any of his track workouts on Strava, where his 10k PR is 30:21. There are articles about his training, like

, where the numbers don't make sense, like doing 10x200 @35 and 10x400 @67. And most importantly, he's never done a flat road or track race. So...

Kilian crushed me (and the rest of the competition like Max King, Andy Wacker, David Sinclair as a few top Americans not to mention the Euros etc) last year at Pikes. Again he is the GOAT. And yes that is my point, Matt's '93 record time on Pikes was an anomaly. I think Killian's run at Pikes last year was really good. Having "home course advantage" is key, but "knowing every rock or stone" on that mountain is over-hyped I think. I mean how many minutes (probably only seconds actually) do you really think that is going to save you? Kilian had raced Pikes before...he did some training runs there also. It's the Barr trail...pretty simple. This isn't like route finding off trail on Nolans 14....It is not a technical trail. Kilian is insanely highly altitude trained (Skimo in the winter , altitude tent at home, big mountain athlete etc!). His 2:25 at Sierre-Zinal last year was insane fitness! His Vo2max (like Matt Carpenter's) is insanely high. He can do fast-runnable mountain trail stuff. So everything points to a very good (record like) Pikes Peak Performance. But again, it was pretty hot last year and a crappy pressure day. I was over 10-minutes behind him. Lets say on a good day with someone pushing him maybe he could have gone low 3:20s at best. He's still 4-5+min off Carpenter's record. I don't think Carpenter ever broke 2:19 in the marathon or 30-min for 10km (or 2:40 for Sierre-Zinal or 59:00 at Mt. WA for that matter). I only bring up the Mt. WA and Sierre-Zinal times because guys like Joe Gray and Jonathan Wyatt and myself have all run faster than Carpenter ever did at those venues and it is a "climbers race". What I'm saying is the 3:16 record time at Pikes is a total outlier and its just weird. At the time it was a 22-min PR for Matt. Then (in all the Pikes Peak races Matt won and ran) he only got within 18-minutes of it one other time with a 3:33 (his second best time on the mountain). Usually he ran 3:40-4:00 hours at Pikes. It would be like if Kipchoge was a solid 2:10-2:12 road marathon guy and then one year he went 1:59 (while setting a half marathon record en route), but then never broke 2:08 again after that. People insist the trail/route has been exactly the same over the decades, but I feel like something just doesn't add up (or something was different in the early 1990s)? We can also note that Mejia ran 3:22 just before...but that guy had also won Sierre-Zinal like 5 times and was a total legend as well! Still, in '93 Mejia was like 25-minutes + behind Matt in 1993 (i.e. he wasn't pushed at all!).

Corin wrote:

Yeah, VKs are no joke and that one is pretty steep because he's using poles.

I wish we'd spot talking about his performance at Pikes Peak, Sage. That is Matt Carpenter's mountain... he knew every rock and step on that mountain, plus the elevation affects everyone differently, even if you are Jornet. Matt literally lived on that mountain and his race performances at SZ and in Europe confirm what an anomaly PPM was to Carpetner as he could not hold his own over seas.

I did a three hour trail run this morning with 6000 ft vert. Then did a 5k road run in 14:10 followed by 10x400 in 59s with 30 sec rest. You can confirm all this because it was measured with a beanpole and timed with an hourglass, then posted on Instagram.

S. Canaday wrote:...

People insist the trail/route has been exactly the same over the decades, but I feel like something just doesn't add up (or something was different in the early 1990s)? We can also note that Mejia ran 3:22 just before...but that guy had also won Sierre-Zinal like 5 times and was a total legend as well! Still, in '93 Mejia was like 25-minutes + behind Matt in 1993 (i.e. he wasn't pushed at all!).

Supposedly he split 2:01 on the ascent, which is a record in and of itself. Looks like no one has come within 4+ minutes of that, even on an ascent only race. Is there a picture of him at the top / turn around? That would seem conclusive enough...can't really short cut up to the top of Pikes Peak.

trickle down economics wrote:

I did a three hour trail run this morning with 6000 ft vert. Then did a 5k road run in 14:10 followed by 10x400 in 59s with 30 sec rest. You can confirm all this because it was measured with a beanpole and timed with an hourglass, then posted on Instagram.

Only difference is that KJ actually has race results. And many of them.

I guarantee, and will bet KJ any amount that he wants, that he will never beat any of my PRs. That's a true fact. Let us know if he ever enters a real race.